I (Don't) Want to Suck Your Blood
by 263Adder
Summary: With Sir Reginald gone, Pogo lets the Hargreeves children dress up for the latest holiday. Five is less than enthused, until he sees what Vanya's arrived as. Series: Paper Chains Part 4.


Tugging on the high collar of his costume, which pressed uncomfortably against his throat, Five scowled at his reflection. Of all the dumb outfits he had to wear since the Academy's first mission, this had to take the cake. Yet, just when he thought it couldn't get any worse, Klaus appeared at his elbow with the icing in hand.

"Don't forget your teeth."

Glancing down at the plastic fangs with distaste radiating from every pore, Five reluctantly plucked up the false teeth.

"Have you been working on your Transylvanian accent?" Klaus asked, thoroughly enjoying Five's irritation. "Remember, it goes like this: _I want to suck your bluhd_."

His terrible attempt at the over-exaggerated drawl made Five's head throb. The evening couldn't end soon enough.

"Think you can manage that?" Klaus prompted, pleased with himself.

Turning away from the mirror, Five pinned Klaus with a look capable of making prison-hardened criminals shit themselves. He quickly rearranged the expression however, when Vanya passed the doorway to Four's room – not looking inside as she hurried to get into her own costume.

Klaus followed Five's eye line, his smile widening wickedly when he saw what had distracted his brother from his intentions of revenge.

"I think I know whose neck _you_ want to suck." He crowed, jabbing an elbow in Five's gut.

Five effortlessly shoved him to the floor in retaliation.

Klaus really needed to apply himself more during strength training, Five thought as he watched him struggle to get back up, that was _far_ too easy. They were meant to be 'superheroes' after all. Ben ended up having to give him a hand, Klaus' costume making it difficult for him to stand without flashing the room – why he had to wear such a short skirt, Five didn't know.

"Don't be mean to Five, Klaus." Ben chastised. "Vanya's probably the only person on the planet Five _doesn't _want to draw blood from."

Five rolled his eyes, wondering at what point that day his brother's had turned against him.

Diego wandered into the room then, his face coated in a thick layer of paint and wearing a suit which looked far too large for his frame. Five hoped he wasn't there to join in on the taunting.

"Klaus are you nearly done, I need help with my costume?" He said, holding up the tub of green paint. "Can you check it's all on behind my ears?"

Unable to resist, Five asked: "We're meant to meet downstairs in ten minutes, Diego. Shouldn't you be getting into your costume already?"

"Ha ha." Diego intoned, shoving him aside so he could assess his own reflection. Five let him, moving away to help Ben instead.

"I still can't believe you didn't agree to be the Fred to my Daphne." Klaus lamented to Ben. "I already had the purple boa and everything."

"You could have been a Ghostbuster too!" Ben pointed out, thanking Five for helping him get the backpack on. "There's four of them, we all could have done it."

"No we couldn't, Diego was all set on being Lurch."

"I'm not Lurch, I'm Frankenstein," Diego said, pointing to his green face. "It's a _classic _costume. Compared to," he waved a hand in Klaus' direction, "whatever the hell that is supposed to be."

"I'm Usagi Tsukino – better known as the _amazing _Sailor Moon!" Klaus replied indignantly. "Something you would know if you stuck your head out of a window once in a while instead of up your ass. It's a global phenomenon!"

"It stopped running five years ago." Ben pointed out.

"See! Even _Ben _knows what it is!"

"Whatever. But Dad will have a heart attack if he sees you in a skirt again."

"Well it's a good thing he's out all night. Besides, he'd react that way if he saw any of our costumes. Fuck knows we're not allowed to have any _fun _around here." Klaus huffed, straightening his blonde wig.

Luther tapped on the door, his shield and plastic sword held in the other hand. "You guys nearly ready? I've just been downstairs and Pogo has got us some pumpkins to carve."

"Awesome sauce!" Klaus exclaimed, ready to skip out the room but Diego stopped him with a hand.

"Hey, you're meant to _help_ me."

Complaining the whole time, wanting to go downstairs and secure the largest pumpkin, Klaus still diligently touched up Diego's paint, so it covered his face and hands completely.

"See Ben, _Luther _agreed to a matching costume." He grumbled while he worked. "Because that's what people who love each other do."

"We're not..." Luther tried to protest.

"Like anyone has a choice when _Allison _decides something. She'd have us all as her court jesters if she wanted." Ben argued.

"I actually chose my costume first..."

"We could have been awesome. All I'm saying." Klaus persisted. "We could still dress you up as Tuxedo Mask now if we improvise a bit."

"I _like _my costume." Ben maintained.

"You've never even seen the movies."

"I've read the comics."

Five rolled his eyes at his brother's antics, convinced he was the only person in the house finding that evening's activity insufferable. Deciding he had endured enough of their nonsense for one day, Five wandered away, planning to go downstairs to await the evenings 'festivities'. Instead, he was stopped in the corridor by the telltale squeak of Allison's door (which Five always suspected Reginald purposefully left unattended to make it harder for her to sneak out to Luther's room).

A red shoe was the first thing he saw, followed by white socks and a blue gingham dress, then Vanya was staring at him – her long hair tied back into two plaits with a basket hooked over her arm, containing a stuffed brown dog.

Suddenly the evening didn't seem so bad.

"Cute dog." Five said, once Vanya got close enough.

"It's Allison's." Vanya shrugged, switching the basket to her other arm. "She said I needed it or no one would guess what my costume is."

"I think the footwear gives it away pretty quickly." He replied, eyeing the shiny red shoes. "But I suppose Allison isn't exactly short on toys. She can spare it for one night."

Vanya smiled. "Well I could have used the rabbit you gave me, but Dorothy has a dog so...it's cute though, isn't it? Sometimes I wish we could have a real dog. That would be nice"

"We can get one when we move out."

She looked at him curiously. "You want a dog too?"

"Yeah." Five said though he was sure he'd agree to an entire menagerie of animals if Vanya gave the slightest indication she wanted it. "Any dog would be lucky to have us."

She still looked at him oddly and it occurred to Five suddenly that he'd never mentioned to her before his envisagement of their future – of the two of them living together, ideally far away from Reginald and any mention of the Umbrella Academy. Away from their nosey siblings, who always managed to interrupt them whenever Five got too close.

If at all possible they'd be sharing a bed too, but Five definitely wasn't mentioning that tonight.

"When we're older." He promised. "We'll find a place and get a dog. If you want. Okay?"

"Okay," Vanya said a little breathlessly, looking up at him with those large brown eyes he sometimes felt it would be possible to fall into and never escape from.

Gently, always expecting her to draw back a little when he chanced getting closer to her, Five pushed one of her braids over her shoulder.

"Can we give it a silly name?" She asked shyly, watching him closely. "Like Bark Twain or Fyodor Dogstoevsky?"

"You love a literary pun, don't you? I like the idea of something like Sir Pawcival or Mr Pennycrumb? Something we'd undoubtedly regret when we're at the dog park calling for it to come back, and everyone's staring at us like we're idiots." Five chuckled.

He hoped she wouldn't ask how long he'd been holding onto those names. He'd been planning their future longer than he cared to mention.

"Those are so cute, especially Mr Pennycrumb!" Vanya grinned. "Okay. Mr Pennycrumb. I can't wait."

"Me neither."

Reluctantly dropping her braid, enjoying the feeling of her soft hair slipping through his fingers, Five couldn't help but comment: "You should wear your hair up more often. It's nice to see your face properly."

She always hid behind her hair, sometimes to his absolute infuriation. Her eyes told him more than she ever did with words.

"Oh. Okay. If you like."

Seeing her blush emboldened him more but, as always, the others turned up to ruin the moment before he could speak again.

Their liberation couldn't come soon enough. Maybe he had been overly optimistic thinking he could wait until they were eighteen to make their dash for freedom.

Allison twirled on the spot, attempting to draw everyone's attention back to her.

Five barely glanced at her pink princess dress before looking back to Vanya.

"Pumpkins?" He asked her warily.

"Pumpkins!" Klaus replied enthusiastically.

Pogo had laid out a plastic sheet over the length of the dining table and he smiled indulgently as the children entered the room.

"Don't we all look wonderful? Luther, what a handsome knight you make." Pogo said, handing him his pumpkin. "And Diego, what a terrifying monster."

The two boys had their training the most ingrained and took their usual seats at the table.

"Allison, that dress is magnificent. Did Grace help you with it?"

Nodding, Allison told him how hard it had been to decide on a colour but "Mom said pink suits me best."

"That it does." Pogo agreed, handing her the third pumpkin from the pile. Naturally, it was the largest of the crop.

"And Klaus, what an _interesting _costume you have on." He frowned.

"I'm Sailor Moon." Klaus beamed, knowing full-well that Pogo would have no clue what that meant but not caring in the slightest.

"That you are, and here you go." Pogo said, handing over his pumpkin.

"But I know what you are." He said when Ben approached. "And I know exactly who to call."

Ben smiled happily.

"Which one did you choose to be?"

"Winston Zeddemore. He's the coolest." Ben said definitively.

Five thought it was bold to suggest any of them could be superior to Spengler but he let it slide.

"Five and Vanya." Pogo looked at the pair as they sidled up together. "An interesting combination, but I'm sure if Dorothy had run into a vampire on her journey she would have stopped to help him as much as any of her other companions. Here you go."

Taking two remaining seats at their usual end of the table, Five kept a wary eye on Vanya as she picked up her carving knife.

"You'll probably want to draw out your sketch for it first." He quietly pointed out, not wanting to sound condescending but also wanting her to keep all of her fingers.

"I know. I was just wondering how much detail I could get with this." She replied, inspecting the large blade.

For some reason seeing Vanya with a knife was more thrilling than he expected, but he ignored that to the best of his ability. Focusing on his pumpkin, determined to have the best of the lot, he began to sketch a ghoul's face on the fruit's thick orange skin.

* * *

_Mr Pennycomb_, Vanya thought indulgently, still smiling to herself. Though it was more that Five had included her in his plans for the future which made her grin, although his choice in their theoretical dog's name certainly contributed to her growing giddiness. She wondered how long he'd been thinking about that; she was certain with his intelligence it hadn't taken him very long, it probably came to him in seconds.

Klaus groaned further along the table, as he saw Pogo pull out a record to put on the phonograph. Everyone expected a lecture to emerge from the speaker yet they were pleasantly surprised when, instead, music began to play.

"Now it's a party," Klaus exclaimed. He set into his pumpkin with perhaps a tad too much vigour, if Ben's concerned expression was anything to go by, the remnants of the pumpkin splattering over the table as he began to slash away with his knife.

Vanya took far more care, not failing to notice Five's own worried face.

She knew it might surprise everyone to know but, despite not take part in combat training, she was rather proficient with a small blade. Vanya regularly helped Grace in the kitchen, preparing vegetables and dicing meat for their dinner. While she was sure her skill would get her nowhere in a fight, she knew she could easily carve her pumpkin.

After sketching a pattern, Vanya began to make her incisions into its flesh. Wanting it to be perfect, she focused on her work so intently she barely noticed when a food fight broke out between the boys, before Mom could whisk away their bowls of scooped-out pumpkin. She didn't even notice Five chivalrously taking a splat of pumpkin guts to the side of his head, as he leaned forward to block them from her path. She also didn't notice his bewildered expression when she tutted at him for the trouble, only finding annoyance at the sudden dimming of the light as he bent over her.

Vanya was the last to finish, to everyone's predictable annoyance, but she was too happy to care. She didn't even mind when they all groaned, telling her the pumpkin was meant to have a _scary _face. Because Five understood straight away.

"Mr Pennycomb?" He asked, looking at the orange puppy face staring back at him.

"Mr Pennycomb." Vanya beamed in response.

* * *

Day four. To BadWolfeRose - thanks for always offering an ear when I'm talking about my TUA work. I hope you enjoy the latest installation.

And that title sounds a bit rude, but it makes sense a few lines in XD I can't remember who it was that requested that Klaus dress up as Sailor Moon but - you're welcome 😉 Vanya was Dorothy as I used to have a Dorothy costume and it was one of my most prized possessions as a kid.

And how am I already halfway through these stories! I'm having so much fun sharing them with you all. I hope everyone enjoyed today's offering! Tomorrow's is going to be a little sadder so savour the fluff, and let me know if you enjoyed it! 3


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